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Notes

S. Popov: So, very significant goals were set for the entire institute and the program: to create new types of agents with characteristics that were unknown [to adversaries]. They were supposed to be more virulent, and they were supposed to be resistant to therapeutic measures that could be, could be applied, and these agents were supposed to demonstrate absolutely new characteristics that would make their identification and treatment difficult... Well, to put it bluntly, in order to kill x number of people, a more effective agent was called for. And all of this was supposed to be achieved using genetic engineering methods. They were considered the main vehicle. There were some specific ideas for how to do that, but at that point, beyond ideas there was really nothing. No one, either in the senior levels at Biopreparat, or among the senior people at the institute itself, knew how to realize these ideas. All of that fell to people in my position... those who did specific, particular experiments.

Several years passed, quite frankly, in attempts at just understanding how this could be done and what basic principles could be applied in order to make, you know, a new disease, to put it bluntly. Or to make an agent which would demonstrate new biological characteristics... by means of genetic manipulation. These included, for example, protein fragments which could elicit the effects of narcotics.

Well, for example, the onset of hallucinations as a result of the process of introducing an infection. Or of convulsions as a result of that. Or sleeplessness, or other behavioral changes.

This research meant that, if we, let's say, took the most harmless strains, vaccine strains of microbes, altered them and then infected the test animals, we saw major changes in those animals' behavior. Up to and including convulsions and death.